Headlines

Michael Thomsen

The case against grades

The catch is that fear of negative outcomes has been repeatedly shown to be a major impediment to learning. A survey of students at the University of Cape Town found that stress and fear of failing tests led to “classic symptoms of procrastination and avoidance,” confusion and low self-esteem. “ … [I]t’s one of those things where if I have to fail a test, I’m Like, ‘Oh my goodness, I can’t fail a test.’ It’s like a really serious strain,” one subject reported. Another showed the classic habit of grade-weighted failure leading to disengagement: “But I just didn’t like the fact that I had failed, so I just moved on to something else.” These responses are echoed by a number of studies that show students’ willingness to take on challenging tasks diminishes when grades are involved, but without grades, students left on their own tend to seek out more challenging problems. …

Free schools have taken the gradeless structure even further, treating the school as an open space where students are not only allowed to self-direct but are given equal responsibility in the organization and rule-making of the school itself. The Summerhill School in England is one of the most recognizable and longest-running, founded in 1921 by A.S. Neill. Summerhill is built around the idea of creating stable, happy, and compassionate humans capable of filling any role in society—a janitor being no less a success than a doctor. In place of dedicated courses, students are free to follow their own interests while teachers observe and nudge them toward new ways of thinking about what they’re drawn to. Students with an interest in cooking, for instance, might learn the basics of chemistry by way of thickening a sauce. Those drawn to playing soccer might learn to improve their game with some fundamental principles of Newtonian physics.

Blowback

Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.

Trackbacks/Pings

Comments

No one should judge anyone else, judging people and the way they perform is mean. It is also racist. High capacity report cards should be banned. How many kids have committed suicide over failing marks? If we can save one life we are obligated to try!

Nobody is better than anyone else and everyone is the best at everything!!

is built around the idea of creating stable, happy, and compassionate humans capable of filling any role in society—a janitor being no less a success than a doctor

The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.

The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.

Nick_Angel on May 3, 2013 at 10:46 AM

Ah Harrison Bergeron, I remember thinking such a world was impossible when I first read it.

Is it fear of a negative outcome that’s impeding ambition and effort, or the lack of positive incentives? To cite one trivial example, I’ve recently discovered that the better a dancer I become (which requires a certain amount of practice and perseverance), the nicer beautiful, shapely women with exotic foreign accents are to me.

It’s not easy to convince children to be “future oriented” especially as therapists have devoted a lot of effort to blaming parents for denying them unconditional love.

Here’s an idea: let’s go with a voucher system and let the parents and communities choose the schools they want to send their kids to.

If a dark-blue, Leftist community wants “grade-free” schools, let them have it. If a more conservative/rational area wants a traditional school, let them have it. Get the federal government out of the equation. Problem solved.

At least for my generation, the best argument for grades was when the math whiz had his GPA destroyed because he couldn’t get the light bulb to go on in shop class, teaching him that there are other qualities the world appreciates besides raw brainpower.

The entire reason for this article is that teachers unions are heavily invested in indolence, mediocrity and seniority. They dislike all those studies that show US public education as well below first-world status, and more expensive than any other public education system.

Everything is relative. In order to draw a distinction, we must have something with which to compare it. How do we know what an idiot is without a smart person for comparison? A liberal dirt bag without the patriotic conservative? The incompetence of Obama with the brilliance of Reagan?

Ah, reminds me of Tyler. The cashier at a local grocery store lamenting to a customer that he got in trouble with management for randomly making up vegetable codes. “Why couldn’t they just tell me I’m doing a good job and not ruin my day?”

(In the Midwest, but if you say that quote with a little bit of surfer in your voice, you’ll get the gist.)

Grades themselves shouldn’t be abolished, but too much emphasis is put on grades and testing, especially in high school. Rather than creating interesting people with unique talents, society is creating Stepford students who all have the same resume and sound alike. For instance, a student might be discouraged to take a creative writing class and encouraged to take AP Chemistry because the creative writing class is not AP or honors credit. This despite the fact that the student may want to become a writer, not a doctor. The AP Chemistry is needed to show admissions that the student has the requisite number of AP classes.

My problem with grades is less that it hurts people’s feelings when it is made clear that they’re not making the grade and more that the grades often do not reflect what students understand.

Much of the problem is that school is effectively a daycare system for children. And as such, their primary focus is warehousing the children until they’re released on society unprepared for how to deal with ANYTHING.

I would separate the system into two components. A daycare system and an education system. The daycare system would require attendance, care about feelings, worry about school lunches, and various things that have nothing to do with actual education. The education system would reside WITHIN that system but apart from it. You do not need to attend and they do not need to tolerate you with in it if they decide you’re a negative influence on the class. Problem students are removed.

Does this leave behind problem students? Yes. But that’s going to happen regardless. In the land of unicorns and rainbows you’re going to be able to save everyone. In the real world, perfect is the enemy of the good. That is, trying to get everything JUST right is impossible and even trying tends to make it impossible to even make things decent. Rather you go for the best of what is possible and accept that that is about as good as it gets.

If you want to dump your children off in an environment where they’re safe and well cared for… great. We’ll offer that. If you want your kid to actually learn something then giving a damn and being respectful is a requirement. If you don’t have that then your child might be lucky to get out of high school learning how to read. Possibly.